Paul Thompson
Sheffield Wednesday

FOOTBALLERS often say that their teammates are a great bunch - but captain Rob Jones has gone further by rating the Wednesday squad as the best he has ever known.

It is also a “surreal” time for the man who has always been a Wednesday fan.

“It’s times like this when you reflect on what you and your team and staff and the supporters have done,” said the 32-year-old centre-half, who won the Scottish League Cup with Hibernian.

“It will take a long time to sink in. Our aim at the beginning of the season was to get promotion and we’ve done it. We’ve had our ups and downs. We finished with a flourish. There was a change of manager. The gaffer has come in and brought a different impetus to the club and the way we play, and the boys have taken it on board very quickly

“The character and determination are not what I’ve seen before; this is by far the best dressing room I’ve been in, and it has a lot of fantastic footballers.”

Jones, who also played for Stockport, Macclesfield, Grimsby and Scunthorpe, won the Player in the Community title at the Owls’ awards evening at Hillsborough,.

Jarrod Kyle, a striker who comes from Australia, was chosen by the club as the Academy Player of the Year, He picked out the 3-0 win against United as his highlight of the Under-18s’ season.